Black Superheroes: Black Panther (Shuri)

MCU Shuri could never!

Name: Shuri

First Appearance: Black Panther #2 (2005)

History: Shuri is the younger sister of T’Challa, only daughter of King T’Chaka, and thus a princess of the nation of Wakanda. Because she is the younger child of the king there was no expectation of her taking the throne or the mantle of Black Panther but the young girl desperately desired the title. She trained for years to achieve this goal, particularly after her father’s murder and her uncle being chosen to succeed him. Unfortunately, her overprotective mother interfered with her attempt to challenge for the mantle and by the time she arrived she discovered that T’Challa had returned from his studies aboard and won the title, and the kingdom, himself

Undeterred, she continued training and hoping for the opportunity to present itself again (aside from a stint being a party girl due to experiencing a traumatic event, but there’s word limit here). The day came when T’Challa was mortally wounded at the hands of Doctor Doom and Shuri was unexpectedly chosen to undergo the trial to succeed her brother. She completed the trials, but she was denied the powers of the Black Panther by Bast the Panther God who declared her motives to be about pride and not about a selfless desire to protect her people. However, she proved herself worth by risking her life to battle Morlun in order to protect her wounded bother and the people of Wakanda, earning Bast’s blessing at last.

Shuri rose to become the new Black Panther and the Queen of Wakanda, ruling in her brother’s place when the need arises.

Beta Says: I know that the MCU is a little notorious for making change to characters they adapt into movies, but I’m not sure if we’ve seen many who have deviated from the source material as much as Shuri. In the comics she was a serious warrior who coveted the Black Panther mantle and went on a years’ long journey before she eventual earned it, while MCU-Shuri is jokey genius scientist who couldn’t be less interested in replacing her bother. This is all fine and good except that I fear we could be seeing another example of the original character being replaced with the movie version, with all the interesting aspects of Shuri pre-MCU fading away.

More about the deadlier of the species after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Debrii

Debrii is best known for how cool she looks in this image

Name: Deborah Fields 

First Appearance: New Warriors #4 (2005) 

History: Nothing is known about the background of Debrii or how she acquired her powers. What we do know is that she was hired to join a recently rebooted version of the New Warriors who were being filmed for a reality television show. Her inclusion was meant to create drama, as she was the only member of the team who was not hand selected by leader Night Thrasher but instead the producers who wanted to create conflict. Debrorah is often referred to be a “low-level telekinetic magnet”, which means that while she has telekinetic abilities she is limited to only being able to lift small things. However, she is not limited by the number of small things she can lift and is able to use her ability to affect various debris in many different offensive and defensive ways. She served on the team until the show’s cancelation, choosing not to rejoin the team when they reformed for a new TV series, the exact version that lead directly to Civil War.

Beta Says: I’ve thought about writing about Debrii every year for the last ten, and what kept me from doing so tended to be ether a) I thought of a more interesting character to write about, or b) I just didn’t feel there was enough about her to warrant the effort. Her lack of origin isn’t simply a writing choice on my part; as far as I’ aware, Marvel has never gone into detail about her background or how she got her powers. She’s a decent example of a black character who falls off the radar once their original book ends, though she shows up a bit over the next six years of her existent.  Ultimately she ended up being one of many pre-Miss Marvel young characters that were introduce in the 2000s only to have fallen by the wayside in the subsequent decades. The difference with Debrii is that she almost found herself as a main character in a adaptation that likely would have completely changed her level of notoriety. Almost.

More padding of the word count after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Nubia

Ororo who?

Name: Nubia 

First Appearance: Wonder Woman #204 (1973) 

History: Hippolyta, queen of the Amazons and ruler of Themyscira, famously made a child out of clay that was brought to life by the gods whom would grow up to be known as Diana and throughout the world as Wonder Woman. However, that is only half the story. In reality, Hippolyta sculpted two baby girls, one made from lighter clay and one from darker clay (…excuse me?). Both girls were brought to life and blessed, but the older baby girl was immediately kidnapped by Ares, the Greek god of War. Ultimately, Hippolyta kept all of this a secret from her younger daughter Diana. Ares would name his captive Amazon “Nubia” (…EXCUSE ME?!?) and trained her in every art of combat from infancy, with the intent of her eventually leading his armies. She fights his influence, her spirit still be loyal to the Amazons, but the god of war used mind control to force compliance. Armed with a sword powerful enough to counter the Lasso of Truth, and possessing the same powers as Diana, Nubia is placed as the ruler of an all-male floating island and is dubbed “The Wonder Woman of Slaughter Island.” Her forces invaded Themyscira and she faced off against her younger twin sister. Thankfully Diana was able to break Nubia free of Ares’ mind control and two worked together to defeat the evil god. 

The truth of her existence now revealed, Nubia left her birthplace and vowed to use her position as a ruler of Slaughter Island to spread the Amazon message of love and peace. The question of who was the one and true Wonder Woman was left unanswered…for now.

Beta Says: I was heavily influenced to do a profile on Nubia in the past few years because there was a recurring theme of pictures of the character circulating social media and racist shitbags getting all upset about “DC turning Wonder Woman black”, having no idea she was separate character. Actually, she’s three separate characters (we’ll get into that ). But if there’s one thing I’d like you to take away from this essay it’s that Nubia was actually DC Comics’ first female black superhero, even predating Marvel Comic’s Storm by two years. 

 Well, actually the main takeaway I want you to have is that Slaughter Island is an amazing name for a base of operation. 

 More on Nubia, but less about Slaughter Island, after thee jump.

Black Superheroes Month XI: Black Girl Magic

There is a lack of black heroine team-up covers

Another trip around the sun, another attempt to do Black Superheroes Month. 

There is an incorrect belief that there are not very many black heroes in comic books, but the actual truth is that there are a ton, but they are so underused and underutilized that it only seems like they are few and far between. Most of the time a black hero is created, used for a few months, maybe years, then is quickly forgotten about. This series is an attempt to profile a few of these characters every year. 

This year I have decided to try something different; we’ll be looking at three new heroes BUT all of them will be BLACK WOMEN, which despite what I just said there is in fact a severely limited pool of female black heroes. In fact, there were so few that I typically try to limit to one per year, so I didn’t run out of topics. Thankfully I think the number has grown enough in the past ten years that I can finally do an All-Woman addition of this blog. So, we will be looking at three female heroes this month, one major character, one minor character, and one who is (supposed to be) historically relevant. 

Next time we begin Black Superhero Month in earnest with a character who is the twin sister of a major DC hero and, predictably, it’s kind of racist.

Beta's Top Ten Favorite Movies of 2025

I really wanted to post more in 2025, but I just didn’t have time. I started at a new job that absolutely DESTROYED my free time. I essentially had time to work on my podcast (Adult Siblings Versus …which you can listen to HERE) and that’s it. But I am still managing to get this Top Ten list on the anniversary of this blog, and I still plan on putting out my annual Black Superhero Month posts next month. 

For today we’ll focus on my top ten favorite movies of 2025. As always, these are my FAVORITE films, not necessarily the objectively best films. Also, as always, there were plenty of films I was unable to get around to watching things like Marty Supreme or One Battle After Another. While I tried to watch Frankenstein, I have never seen a movie that needed to be viewed on a big screen rather a TV more and I couldn’t maintain interested solely based on that. 

 I did watch Elio with my son last year, however, which is the most recent Pixar film. I want to take a moment to mention how much I liked it (he liked it too) and how wrong the modern idea that Pixar movies just not being good anymore is. It JUST barely didn’t make the list. Blame Benoit Blanc for that one.

My favorite movies of 2025 after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Moon Girl

Welp...that's f**king terrifying!

Name: Lunella Lafayette 

First Appearance: Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur #1 (2015) 

History: Lunella Lafayette is a Haitian-American 9-year old girl who also just happens to possess absurdly high intelligence. Even with her genius intellect, she is unable to get into schools more appropriate for her and languishes in her local public school, inventing things both publicly and in secret. At some point Lunella discovered that she was a latent Inhuman, superpowered individuals whose powers activate when exposed to Terrigen crystals or mist…and it just so happen that a rogue Terrigen cloud has been floating throughout the world transforming all latent Inhumans in touches. To save herself, she found a Kree Omni-Wave Projector but it somehow opened a portal that brought Devil Dinosaur into New York City. With his own partner, Moon Boy, just killed, Devil strikes an odd bond with Lunella, and, eventually, the two decided to work together as Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur.

 ….and then Lunella gets stuck by the Terrigen cloud she was trying to hard to avoid. Thankfully, her powers don’t cause a physical change, as she had been fearing, but rather it grants her the power to switch minds with Devil. With their bond, Devil’s brute strength, and Moon Girl’s super genius and array of homemade gadgets, the pair attempt to find their place in the greater superhero world. 

 Beta Says: Before Moon Girl debuted if you had asked me if I thought cult classic Devil Dinosaur could work in a modern setting I would have said “no.” The fact that his introduction also included the creation of one of the most original black superheroes of the day would have been completely beyond my comprehension. And yet, Moon Girl replacing the not quite human Moon Boy, has been one of the most successful new characters in Marvel’s attempt to add further diversity to their books. She even had her own animated series that recently premiered on Disney+. (…and it’s canceled? Maybe?!) Could Lunella, a character who is confirmed to be the smartest person in the Marvel Universe, be the mainstream black superhero we’ve been looking for? 

It's too bad that Marvel anchored her to their biggest marketing mishap in modern Marvel history. 

 More on the latest and greatest dynamic duo after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Amazing-Man (I, II, & III)

1940s heroes who is drawn suspiciously like a 1980s hero

Name(s): Will Everett, Will Everett III, Markus Clay 

First Appearance(s): All-Star Squadron #23 (1983), Justice League America #86 (1994), Justice Society of America Vol. 3 #12 (2008)

History: Will Everett was a medal winning athlete who competed in the Berlin Olympics in 1936, but despite that, due to the racism of the time, he fell into obscurity shortly after and the only work he could get was as a janitor for a laboratory belonging to Doctor Terry Curtis. During an incident involving the Ultra-Huminite kidnapping Curtis, Everett as caught in a explosion that granted him super powers. He gained the ability to transform his body into a replica of matter that he touched. Initially he was forced to serve the Ultra-Huminite as the henchman “Amazing-Man”, alongside Curtis (who also developed powers and was forced to operate as “Cyclotron”), but he soon rebelled and instead joined the All-Star Squadron and became one of the most prominent heroes of the era.

Will’s career took a turn when J. Edgar Hoover (stinking sucker) revealed his identity to the public, putting him and his family in danger. Following this, Everett turned his focus to the Civil Rights movement, where he ended up becoming an important figure comparable to Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcom X. Somehow. As the years went by, he started a family, but when his son died, he took his grandson, Will Everett III, into his care. Eventually Will Sr. would die of cancer, and it was ambiguous if it was a direct result of his powers, but Will III was traumatized by it, nonetheless.

In college, Will III developed powers similar to his grandfather but he thought of them as a curse as he desperately wanted to live a normal life. In time, however, he resigned himself to taking up the Amazing-Man mantle, despite believing it would be the eventual death of him. He would join the Justice League when asked by Wonder Woman and served in various incarnations of the team until he proved himself right and died in action, killed by a supervillain named Mist.

Sometime after this, Marcus Clay, Will III’s cousin and Will Sr.’s other grandson, developed similar powers as well and began operating as Amazing-Man in post-Katrina New Orleans, where he differed from his immediate predecessor by not only acting as a superhero but also a community activist, as he believed that aspect of their grandfather’s legacy was the more important one. He was recruited to join the recently revamped Justice Society of America, a team that included several of his grandfather’s contemporaries as well as legacy heroes like himself.

Pictured: The most recent Amazing-Man
Well, the most recent that doesn't completely suck

Beta Says: Geez, I feel like I’ve been sitting on this one for many years, partially because I wasn’t sure how to approach it. Do I focus on the first Amazing-Man? Do I give each one their own profile? Ultimately, because all three of them have  pretty short histories, it would be okay to do all three at once. The main thing about the first Amazing- Man though is his similarity to other modern characters, in that he, despite his bio, is NOT a creation of the Golden Age of Comics but a character created in the 80s, retroactively having been active during the 1940s. In this way he is extremely similar to Sentry, the Blue Marvel, and one of the Captains America. But Will predated all of them by several decades.

More on the amazing history of the Everett family after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Sunspot

Look, when I said "black heroes" I didn't mean literally

Name: Roberto "Bobby" da Costa 

First Appearance: Marvel Graphic Novel #4 (1982) 

History: Bobby da Costa was not the typical kid. Born to Afro-Brazilian millionaire Emmanuel da Costa, he lived a life of affluence but was also a high-level athlete, particularly skilled in football (that’s “soccer” for you uneducated swine). Despite this he was haunted by racism directed him for being the biracial son of a black man. This came to a head during one of his football matches, where racists from the opposing team brutally attacked him in a racially motivated hate crime. However, it was a that moment that Bobby’s mutant abilities emerged, allowing him to absorb solar energy and transferring them into superpowers (including super strength, flight, and able to create concussive blasts of solar energy, while also taking on pitch black skin while he’s powered up). 

Shortly after this, Bobby’s girlfriend Juliana, the only person who stood by his side when his powers manifested, was kidnapped by goons working for Donald Pierce of the Hellfire Club to lure him into a trap. During the struggle, Karma and Dani Moonstar, two recent recruits of Professor Charles Xavier, arrive to help rescue the two, but ultimately Juliana took a bullet for Bobby and died in his arms. 

Fueled by a need for revenge against Pierce, Bobby returned with Karma and Dani to Xaviers’ School for Gifted Youngsters and becomes of founding member of the New Mutants, the next generation of X-Men, taking on the codename “Sunspot.” 

Beta Says: To be completely transparent here, I’m not the most familiar with Sunspot. The reason for this is because even now after well over 30 years of being a comic book fan The New Mutants has always been and remains a weird blind spot for me. Because of this, I am ashamed to admit it was many years before I was aware that Bobby was black; I thought he was just Latino. However I was not alone in this false belief, as poor Roberto has had the “afro” part of his ethnic identity changed, forgotten, or otherwise ignored possibly more than any other black superhero in history. And that’s what we’re talking about today. Buckle up; I’m pretty pissed off.

More about the black erasure of Sunspot after the jump.

Black Superheroes Month X: Black Excellence

What, no Static? No Bronze Tiger? For shame!

Forcing myself out of hibernation to do another year of talking black superheroes; it’s Black Superheroes Month yet again, probably my only proper contribution to the world….until President Farts McGoo outlaws black superheroes. “Something something DEI.”

For those who wandered here by accident (which is likely most of you at this point? I don’t think I have regular reader anymore), every year I profile several black comic book superheroes. You see, while the vast majority of superheroes have always been white, there is a misconception that there are hardly any black heroes out there. In fact, there’s a lot but most of them get lost in the shuffle, either because they didn’t remain a priority to the publisher or they weren’t made in good faith and probably shouldn’t have been conceived to begin with. (Looking at you, Triathlon!) So I like to write about these characters to educate folks and give some interesting, maybe lesser known characters a little spotlight.

This year we will be looking at three heroes, two from Marvel Comics and one from DC Comics, one of whom is a character who I have had to push back a few times but will finally get to this month. I have to say, however, that I am aware of the lack of love to DC in these blogs the last few years. I think it’s of combination of 1) me being casually aware of more Marvel heroes who are black, 2) that I think generally Marvel does a better job of highlighting their black characters than DC, and 3) I’m genuinely have been bad of keeping up with some of the newer characters DC have created in the last ten years. I don’t know, I could have written about Bloodwynd, I guess, but I decided we were better off with the Marvel character I picked over him (who will be our third character this year).

I feel like I’ve been seeing Nubia in DC promotions a lot the last year or so, or at least someone who looks like Nubia. I don’t know enough about her to write a profile this year, but maybe she’s a good featured character for 2026…

If seeing a black Amazon triggers you, kindly touch grass

Anyway, our first character is someone who has been seeing a lot of high profile attention in the last year, but who also is in the running for the biggest victim of black erasure in all of superhero comics.

Beta's Top Ten Favorite Movies of 2024

I’ve been away from the blogging space, and most of that is because, well, 2024 was a garbage year. I dealt with medical issues all year long, my wife and I bought a new house and a lot of things went wrong when we did, and worst of all my father passed away (well, worst of all is actually that American re-elected Biff Tannen despite him being a convicted felon, but I digress). But today is the 15 year anniversary of Beta is Dead so it would be good to post something. Plus next month is still Black Superheroes Month, so getting back into the grove of writing is necessary. 

 2024 wasn’t my favorite year for movies and I actually struggled to write a Favorite Movie list this year. Shoutout to The Bikeriders, which didn’t quite make the cut, and also Drive-Away Dolls which I had been looking for to for months and months but ended up being delayed into 2024…and it was just okay, sadly. Also Lisa Frankenstein, which I wanted to love,  but just didn't have what I needed in a film (even though the two leads were great)

My favorite movies of 2024 after the jump.

Adult Siblings Versus...Episode 91: Spider-Man (2002 Film)

Working our way through the back archive of the Adult Siblings Versus...continues. This episode, we looked at the  the 2002 Spider-Man film and discuss the singe greatest portrayal of a superhero character in film:

J.K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson.

"Get me pictures...PICTURES OF SUPERMAN!"
".....I mean 'Spider-Man'. Sorry everyone."

More details after the jump.

Adult Siblings Versus...Episode 90: Class Act

As I continue to dump out the old episodes form the past quarter, today we look at the episode of Adult Siblings Versus...where we looked at the fourth most famous movie by 90s rap duo Kid ‘n Play; Cass Act, where in at no point does a house party occur.

Their movie career is like a dark, alternative universe path that Will Smith avoided

More details after the jump.

Adult Siblings Versus...Episode 89: Project A-ko

Alright, I will try to catch up to the actual podcast, as we are quite behind.

In this episode of Adult Siblings Versus...we looked at Project A-ko, which in a way was the patient zero of our anime obsession when we were kids.

If you're only ever going to watch one sci-fi, lesbian school girl anime
Make it this one!

More details after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Nick Fury, Jr.

Step 1: Make him black. Step 2: ???
Step 3: New readers, somehow!

Name: Marcus Johnson

First Appearance: Battle Scars #1 (2012)

History: Marcus Johnson lived a relatively normal life. He was raised by a single mother and entered the army out of high school, where he eventually became an Army Ranger. While serving overseas in Afghanistan, he was informed that his mother had been murdered. Returning the Untied States for the funeral, Marcus was ambushed by assassins and the super criminal mercenary known as the Taskmaster, the same people who killed his mom. While he was rescued by SHIELD and Captain America, he was deliberately not told why he and his mother had been targeted. Soon Johnson was attacked again only to be saved by the man revealed to be his long-lost father, none other than former Director of SHIELD Nick Fury. In the ensuing adventure, the two teamed up, got captured, Johnson lost his eye during torture (and it just happened to be the exact same eye his father famously is missing), and the two managed to defeat the man behind the whole plot; Orion. Afterwards Johnson agrees to join SHIELD as its newest agent, taking the name that is revealed to have been his birth name: “Nick Fury, Jr.”

History: Overly contrived plotline that suggests the publisher has no respect for its readers, thy name is Marcus Johnson. I don’t often write these Black Superhero profiles about characters I despise and, indeed, I don’t hate Baby Fury as a character in the same way I hate the Sentry (may his MCU appearance Rest is Piss).  However, his creation is the most extreme version of a concept I hate in comic books. I generally don’t mind changes of characters’ traits in adaptations so long as the spirit of the character remains intact, but every so often Marvel or DC will take that change and implement it back into the current comic and that’s the thing I loathe; it becomes a snake eating its own tail. In this case, having a white, cigar chomping ,World War II vet named “Nick Fury” was apparently bad for business when Samuel L. Jackson was playing the character in the biggest movies of the 21st Century. You know what that means; MINORITY REPLACEMENT, BABY!

Haven't seen the marketing team this power mad since the Clone Saga 

It's more complicated than simply replacing, say, Ray Palmer with Ryan Choi. In fact, to tell the full story of how Fury Lad came to be we must start eleven years before his first appearance. In fact, this is actually the story of four separate characters over two separate mediums.

More on Kid Fury after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Lightning

I don't know why she's naked in her powered form
Seems kind of weird for a teen hero

Name: Jennifer Pierce

First Appearance: Kingdom Come #1 (1996); Justice Society of America (vol. 3) #12 (2008)

History: Jennifer Piece is the youngest daughter of the legendary protector of the Suicide Slum, Black Lightning. As with her older sister Anissa, she was born with a dormant metagene that emerged in her adolescence. Despite this, Black Lightning made it clear that he would not allow either of his children to follow in his footsteps as a hero. Where Anissa gained to ability to control her density, Jennifer instead gained powers similar to their father; the ability to generate and control electricity. In addition she gained the power to fly and to generate an electric aura that came in the form of a golden and spiky appearance. The day she graduated college Anissa, defied their father and became the hero known as Thunder. Over the next few years Black Lightning watched his oldest daughter struggle to find her footing without his help and it made him second guess his decision. With Jennifer, who was having a hard time controlling her abilities, he decided to take the opposite route and make sure she was trained properly in the use of her powers and in fighting crime. To that end he had Jennifer join the Justice Society of America so that they they could give her the mentorship she needed. Soon after she became known as “Lightning.”

Beta Says: If she, along with her sister, hadn’t appeared in the CW Black Lightning show a few years back I’d be certain that Jennifer would be forgotten. In the comics it has been quite a long while since we’ve seen the second daughter of Jefferson Pierce. Hell, the last time we saw was I think at least two reboots ago, so I’m not even sure if she still exists in the current DC continuity. I would say that she is a whole category below Thunder in relevance in the DC Comics, which is a bit annoying considering she debuted with a bit of hype. It’s interesting that she fell in the background, as Jennifer is actually a much older character than you’d think, because the character actually debuted twelve years earlier in the fantastic and historically relevant miniseries Kingdom Come. Sort of.   I shall explain.

 More on the golden child of the Black Lightning clan after the jump.

Black Superheroes: Blade

"Some motherf@#$ers are always trying to ice skate uphill!"

Name: Eric Cross Brooks

First Appearance: The Tomb of Dracula #10 (1973)

History: Tara Vanessa Cross-Brooks, who was in labor, sought shelter at a brothel in London, England. A doctor was called in after she started experiencing complications, but it turned out that it was a vampire in disguise: Deacon Frost. Frost drained Tara of her blood before being chased away. Sadly, Tara did not survive the incident. Her son, Eric Brooks, who was still in the womb when she was bitten, lived despite odds. Because of the circumstances of his birth, Eric was born with a natural immunity to vampire bites and an innate and deep hatred of all vampires. He was raised in the brothel for a few years before he came under the tutelage of veteran vampire hunter Jamal Afari, who trained him in his profession. Over the years Eric became an Olympic-level athlete, a top notch fighter, and a master of weapon combat, though he was especially skilled with knives and daggers which earned him the nickname “Blade.”

Blade would become one of the most prominent vampire hunters in the world, with clashes with the legendary vampire Dracula to his name and teaming up with other famous hunters. However, his life took an unexpected turn years later when he encountered Morbius, the Living Vampire. Morbius bit him and, likely due to his significantly different nature compared to other vampires and possibly because of Blade’s unique physiology, the British hunter had a sort of mutation that granted him super strength and more obvious vampiric traits (including fangs and a bloodlust) but an immunity of sunlight and other weaknesses. With his training, years of experience, and his newfound powers, the “Daywalker” is the most famous, skilled, and feared vampire slayer in the world.

Blade is the only one capable of stopping Morbin Time
Well, Blade and Box Office returns...

Beta Says: Wow, I cannot believe that I’ve been doing Black Superheroes Month since 2011 and it took me all this time to remember to write about Blade, who was the goddamn most famous comic book character in America for a bit. I think it’s two reasons: 1) I feel like I kept pushing Blade back saying “I’ll do him next year” in favor of a character I found more interesting and 2) I sometimes forget Blade exists, as he’s actually not all that popular in the comics. He’s a C-tier character at best and yeah, every few years Marvel will try to give him an ongoing, but they always end up canceled. It’s crazy to think that Blade is kind of ho-hum in terms of comics prevalence, considering he single handedly saved the concept of superhero movies.

More on the weird dichotomy of Blade after the jump.

Black Superheroes Month IX: Black Power

I uh...I'm not sure who everyone in this picture is
Well, this is embarrassing

Another year, another chance to write about Black Superheroes.

For the uninitiated, there is a common misconception that there are not very many black heroes in superhero comics, so every year (…mostly) I write a series of blogs about various characters to showcase that there are actually a lot of black heroes around, but most of them are horribly underutilized. This year, unless something goes wrong, I will be writing three profiles throughout the month of February. All my previous articles can be found here.

This year I struggled to pick who to talk about, partially because I have way too many male heroes to choose and way too few female heroes to pick from (there is actually a deeply concerning lack of black superheroines out there, sadly). Originally, I was going to make Sunspot of the New Mutants my featured character this year, as the last few years (and the last forty years actually) there has been controversy over whether or not a character who was depicted as Afro-Brazilian in his early appearances should be drawn with dark skin or be played by a black actor, and I’ve gotten f**king sick of it. However, a different character I should have thought of earlier came to mind whom I realized I had to do ASAP and since the third character this year is non-negotiable as well it was either Sunspot or a profile on a female hero, and since I don’t like the idea of this being an all-dude month I’ll talk about all my very angry thoughts regarding poor Roberto next year.

Later we learn his secondary mutation is "White Washing"

Next time instead will look at a character that is overdue being looked at on this blog, as for a brief time they were the most famous and popular comic book hero in all of pop culture.

Adult Siblings Versus...Episode 88: Stop! (war)Hammer Time!

 Still catching up with the backlog of episodes of Adult Siblings Versus...

This episode goes completely off the rails, as I bombard my sister with too much information about he tabletop wargame Warhammer 40,000. When I said this was a nerd blog I f**king meant it!

My main army are the Space Wolves
And yes, I do prefer the doggo helmets

Also here's a video I made using an audio clip form the episode

More details after the jump.

Beta's Top Ten Favorite Movies of 2023

Today marks fourteen years since my first bog post on Beta is Dead. As has been the custom, I will celebrate by sharing my To Ten Movie list of the past year, in this case 2023.

As usual, take in mind that this is my personal list of favorite movies, not an objective “Top Films of the Year” list, since I didn’t watch every single movie. This is just my personal opinion and, frankly, I’d be interested to hear your favorite movies of the year in the comment section.

Some quick notes about some honorable mentions: I really enjoyed The Marvels and Blue Beetle (especially Blue Beetle) but neither appears on the list because there were just way too many better flicks this year. I still want to make a special note that they were both good and should have done better at the Box Office. Also, Barbie just barely got edged off of the list, and I struggled with this quite a bit. I think it was great, and on any other year it would have made it on here easily. However don’t be surprised if you see the other half of Barbenheimer shortly.

Full Top Ten after the jump.

Adult Siblings Versus...Episode 87: Home Alone 2 - Lost in New York

 Happy New Year. I'm trying to catch up on past episodes of Adult Siblings Versus before it goes completely off-the-rails. For Christmas, we revisited Home Alone 2: Lost in New York and were pleasantly surprised how unique it was.

Just kidding; that shit was trash.

Do the exact same thing as before and you'll make all the money

More details after the jump.